Multi-talented artist Karina Rykman’s debut full-length, Joyride, is a collection of dreamy, electro-based, pop rock with jammy flourishes that easily floats out over the nine collected tracks.
The NYC artist plays guitar, and bass, and sings effervescently on the album, having written Joyride with longtime friend Gabe Monro, who co-produced and also plays keys/synth bass throughout. The other co-producer will get more of the headlines though as Phish’s Trey Anastasio is onboard and also plays guitar on five of the nine offerings.
The record begins far from those jam band lands as the title track kicks things off in disco pop fashion as a neon glow colors Rykman’s sound. Dreamy keys and synth bass drift along during the aptly titled “Fever Dream” before a dynamite outro guitar solo, this pattern happens often on the album, including the pulsing pop of “All That You Wanted” as the bright shiny song obtains a textured guitar finale while the electro keys minimalism of “Beacon” is less successful.
Rykman moves away from her pop foundation during “Skylark Slowlark” which deploys light funk and a weird shifting mid-song break as the tune fully resembles a modern Phish track. So does “Run of the Mill” which uses deep bass, distorted vocals, and the crunchiest, heaviest, guitar work on the album. The instrumental “Plants” is extended with twinkling spacey progressions, also touching on improv styling, but it was when Rykman mixes her two worlds that she obtains the best results.
That occurs on two of the efforts “Elevator” and “Trampoline”. A light dancey groove propels “Elevators” skyward on skittering drums, accented by a good guitar solo with a light psych rock ending. “Trampoline” wraps up the debut album with swirling techno-inspired beats and keys, vibrating modern pop and layers of guitars.
The lushly produced Joyride is a bright, swirling, easy-rolling, modern pop rock offering as Karina Rykman proves she can be a pop star with a musician’s pedigree.
